So, I took Penny to the doctor Friday afternoon for her rash, and the doctor said, "Oh, it looks like hand, foot, and mouth disease. But I'm going to do a strep test, just to be on the safe side."

Then she pried Penny's mouth open and swabbed her throat, and left. She came back ten minutes later and said, "Surprise! It's strep!" and wrote us an antibiotic prescription.

"Oh," I thought. "Guess that means I should get my own sore throat looked at."

My doctor's office is two blocks from Penny's, so we stopped in. Unfortunately, they could not fit me in, but they made an appointment for me for today.

I grumbled and groused and took Penny to the drugstore to fill her antibiotic prescription, and she ran away from me twice to go pull greeting cards out of their rack by the handful, but settled down once I'd promised to buy her some bottled water and a bag of sugar-free gummi bears.

We went home and did the usual thing, and she was heading for the steps to go to bed when Matt got home.

So she didn't go to sleep for another half-hour or more, and was so excited that she woke up several more times through the night.

But it was wonderful to see him, even if I was sick the whole time. And he took over most of the baby-wrangling, so I actually got to sleep in on Saturday until nearly eight. Ah, heaven. (Sunday, my throat hurt too much, so I gave up and got up at 6 with Matt and Penny.)

Matt's new Saturday tradition is making pancakes for breakfast. He saw no reason to give it up just because he was home. Penny was very excited to "help."

We had a good time, and ate pancakes and pizza and ice cream and chocolate, so even if I had a sore throat, I wasn't feeling too deprived and under the weather.

Saturday afternoon, my doctor called. He'd been going through the office notes, and saw I'd come in. I explained about Penny and told him my symptoms, and he said, "Yep, sounds like collateral damage. I'm cancelling your appointment for Monday and what pharmacy do you want me to call?"

Too late, alas, for me to reinstate either of the invitations I'd had to cancel for Sunday -- to stop and visit the Hickseses after dropping Matt off, or to have dinner with John and Sam. Both places were going to have small children present, and I really didn't want to chance giving the kids strep because I'd only been on my antibiotics for eighteen hours.

I was, however, willing to risk my parents' adult and relatively robust immune systems. So on Sunday, after we'd dropped Matt off at the airport, we went over to my parents' house for dinner and to welcome them back from their Cancun trip.

(My worries about Penny freaking out when Matt left were, as usual, groundless. She chattered happily all evening about how her Daddy was in an airplane, up in the sky, like a cloud! At random moments, she would say, "Look! Up inda sky! SUPER Daddy!")

My parents were pleased as punch to see Penny -- it'd been weeks, you know! I'm sure everyone will be terribly shocked to learn that they'd brought presents for her -- a couple of dresses (which we had to disuade Penny from wanting to wear immediately) and two little wooden puzzle/magnets in animal shapes.

I got a present, too: a silver necklace pendant with my name on it in Mayan heiroglyphs.

Mom made lemon chicken and broccoli for dinner, which was good even if lemon was not quite what my throat needed. And we had (of course) ice cream for dessert.

So, all in all, a pretty good weekend. Though of course it could've been better if there hadn't been any sickness floating around the house. I felt bad for Matt, coming home for his long-awaited vacation, only to find himself amongst the ill. On the other hand, it meant that I didn't have to try to take care of Penny solo while I was sick, so that was nice for me.

I'm feeling somewhat better today, though my throat is still a bit sore and my neck is a bit achey. But yesterday was worse despite taking Advil in threes and fours, so it's definitely improvement. If I can just get through the Monday meeting, I think I'll be okay.

I hope Matt is okay. He'd turned up with a sore throat yesterday, and while strep's incubation period is usually a bit longer... Well, he promised he'd write his office's administrator and ask her what the procedure was, if he needed a doctor while he was on travel.

--Liz